Groups

Courses within PolyLearn can contain groups. These groups can be used to separate the students into smaller groups which can collaborate together on activities. There is also the option to make these groups invisible to one another, which can allow the instructor to hide certain groups from seeing one another in the course. This can be helpful to keep roles such as the TA anonymous.

Managing Groups

Grading Groups

Using Groups

Enabling groups

Warnings about groups...

WARNING: Wait to create groups until the Add / Drop period is
over... then DELETE those students from your course.

Once a student has been added into a group and they have
participated in a group wiki, you cannot change their group association.
Changing which group the student is in WILL break the wiki page
and it will no longer be viewable to you or the student.

The use of groups within a PolyLearn course is controlled by a setting within the course's settings. This setting is turned off by default and therefore must be turned on in the course in order for the instructor to use groups.

In the Adminstration block, click the Edit settings.

Click the Expand All button in the upper right hand corner to show all settings.

Scroll down to the Groups section. Select either Separate groups or Visible groups from the Group mode pull-down menu.

Separate groups - The groups can not see one another within the course.

Visible groups - The groups are visible to one another. They can also see the activities that are associated with the other groups.

Choose whether or not the course will Force group mode. This will make all the activities within the course use groups.

Click Save changes at the bottom of the page.

Creating a new group

Once groups are enabled in the course, the instructor will need to create the groups that the users will be separated into. There can be as many groups in the course as the instructor desires.

In the Adminstration block, click the Users.

Click the Groups option underneath the Users heading.

Click the Create group button.

Enter the Group name.

Options

The Group description will allow the instructor to make a note describing the group, such as the reason for the group or its sample contents.

Enrolment keys will cause the user to be automatically added to the group when they enroll in the course using the key.

Hide picture will set whether the group's id picture is displayed within the course's activities.

New pictures can be uploaded for the group. This picture will display within activities if the Hide picture setting is set to No.

Click Save changes.

Adding students to a group

Once there are groups within the course, users within the course, including the instructor, can be added to one or more of the groups.

In the Adminstration block, click the Users.

Click the Groups option underneath the Users heading.

Click the group from within the Groups list that the instructor will add a user to.

Click the Add/remove users button underneath the Members of list.

Select the users from the list of Potential members who will be added to the group.

Note: Hold down the "Ctrl" button to select multiple users.

Click the Add button.

Click Back to groups.

Grouping the Groups

Creating a new grouping

If you want to make an activity (such as an assignment or a quiz) visible to only one set of users within a course, you need first to put the users into a group and then put them into a grouping. A single grouping can house one group or several groups.

If you assign an activity to a grouping then only the group/grouping that is selected will be able to see and do the activity. It will be invisible to other groups or groupings.

This can be very helpful if you merge course sections and have groups for each section. Then you want to create working groups for graded activities. Those working groups would be added to a Grouping.